You say that "in the UK, the Home Office estimates that ID fraud costs £1.7 billion (US$330 billion) to the UK economy, nearly 50% up on 2002." ("Online identity theft", in No 268, June 2008) If everyone is given a "place" on the net where people can be contacted, that also creates an opportunity for people to protect themselves. But this "place" must be made safe, and therefore must be seen by governments as part of their country's normal infrastructure. Integrity is the key word.

Your article on Islamic banking ("Islamic banking: an asset of promise?" No 272 April 2009) suggests that financial temperance is still possible. The ratio of assets leveraged against capital cited in the article, 20 to 1 in US banks, 30 to 1 in Europe, yet only 10 to 1 in Islamic banks reveals just how much the financial system has made greed systemic.

OECD faces a huge challenge of image. You insist that the organisation, known for its in-depth analyses and reliable statistics, aims to represent all relevant economies. Emerging countries, however, cultivate the impression that the OECD, despite its co-operation and development efforts well beyond its membership, is still the voice of "rich nations" only.

Scott McQuade writes about the prospects for digital devices as a replacement for paper publications ("Print online ?", OECD Observer No 270-271 January 2009). However, the evidence, so far, does not support the thesis that dedicated e-book readers such as Kindle, Sony Reader and iRex will become the platform of choice for book readers.

I've no doubt that there will be a role for (fewer) newspapers in the years ahead, and that paper will continue to remain viable for specialist print applications ("Print screen", by Larry Kilman, World Association of Newspapers, in No. 268, July 2008). However, it is inevitable that online access and digital devices will displace a lot of paper in the long run.

Bravo on the fisheries committee for its 100th meeting (No 264/265, December 2007-January 2008). The attention you bring to fishers is valuable, and your line against fish piracy commendable too. However, I sometimes wonder if your reform ideas, many of them good, don’t sometimes go a little too far.

One of the main challenges for the future will undoubtedly be the migration of a highly skilled workforce from Asia (see for instance, “Globalisation and Labour Markets: Policy Issues Arising from the Emergence of China and India”, OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Paper No 63, November 2007, www.oecd.org/migration).

The world economy faces challenges from the new powerhouses of China and India (see Nos 263 and 264/265, 2007). In order to compete, there is a case for closer co-operation between developed countries and, in particular, tighter integration in Europe.

Well done on a clever choice of photo for “Africa: An emerging markets frontier” (No 263, October 2007). Africa is certainly in a better state than it was and, as you point out, all that new investment coming from around the globe is encouraging. The test is how long it will all last.

You rightly point out that “the supply of medical staff reflects global movements of labour” (No 262, Databank, July 2007). But many of us might disagree with your upbeat headline: “Healthy immigration”. In a report published in 2005, the Royal African Society argues that while recruitment of African medical professionals has shored up western health services, it has left the health sector in sending countries facing permanent crisis or even complete collapse.

Prof Vaclav Smil’s lucid and measured thinking is correct in that we must be realistic about renewable energy’s future (No 258/259, December 2006). But I wonder if he is not being too dismissive of solar energy.

The “pay-as-you-go” government pension system common to many countries, as you point out, will not be financially sustainable, the result of the rapid ageing of societies in developed countries (No 262, July 2007). As your graph shows, the only way to fund the pensions deficit will be through one or all of the following measures: a large tax increase, a substantial decrease in benefits or a significant raise in the retirement age.

As you point out, a key cause of the problems of the Doha trade round has been a lack of understanding among voters and opinion makers in the developed world on the importance of farm trade liberalisation (No 257, October 2006).

The figures you give for the dramatic fall in support for economic infrastructure and agriculture as part of total bilateral ODA between 1995/96 to 2002/2003 are sobering (No. 261, May 2007). There is increased emphasis on these two areas by development agencies, but it will be important to see if resource commitments actually follow–particularly for aid and investments in agriculture. But didn’t NEPAD members at Maputo commit to invest 10% of GDP in agriculture, not to increase investments by 10%?

Your energy focus covers the renewable question well (No. 258-259, December 2006). But what if the renewable promise became a broken one? It might, if mindsets don’t change. Thanks to technological advances and climate change fears, energy has pushed to the front stage again. Governments have been slower to move. Also, as Vaclav Smil’s article shows, the current energy system is based on high-energy density sources, like oil and coal, supplying nationwide energy grids (“21st century energy: Some sobering thoughts”).